computer science or computer engineering??

This is a discussion on computer science or computer engineering?? within the A Brief History of Cprogramming.com forums, part of the Community Boards category; right now i am a comp sci major, but i am considering becoming a comp engineering major. i think i ...

computer science or computer engineering??

right now i am a comp sci major, but i am considering becoming a comp engineering major. i think i would like the more hands-on work. some other people have said it would open up more opportunities for me. any comments?

Im not totally sure about this...but I think computer engineering is more working with hardware...and really low level programming...not sure though...computer science is more the standard C++ type of stuff...making programs...

Well computer science deals with very specific things in realtion to hardware and how to create processors and stuff like that. I would suggest looking at or buying a computer engineering book and seeing how hard the stuff seems for you, and I don't mean something like "A+ Certification for dumbies". You might wanna try to get a book like the one we have to use in my hardware programming class which was written by my professor, but it is in most major book store, and is called "Introduction to Computer Engineering: Logic Design And The 8086 Microprocessor"

yup, compsci isn't just programming; gotta know the hardware stuff too! and compeng isn't just hardware; gotta know the software as well... i think the real difference is that compeng students will dive much deeper into hardware than just knowing how to assemble logic chips together to make a small digital system; i think they probably study stuff like the transistor-level design of logic gates and probably the internal functionality of various transistors (semiconductor physics, amplifiers..). also compsci students probably get more into pure/discrete mathematics (algorithms, languages, data structures) as well as software engineering (as someone has mentioned..) and of course comp. architecture/hardware at the high-level (processor, memory, bus, i/o...) rather than low-level (like at EE level). which is harder? compeng students; hands down...

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to your quesion: i know what the difference between the degrees is, just want to know if anyone has any stories of the real difference it makes in the world
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honestly? i think programmers are a dime a dozen; if you have the opportunity to get into hardware, DO IT!

being a computer engineering student right now, and working with computer science students a lot of the time, there is a fairly big difference. CEs, are as stated above... more concerned with transistors/amplifiers.... then again, that also applies to electrical engineering... but since the two are so close together, you can't really seperate them...

CS students are taught more how to manipulate the hardware with code... CE students are taught how to manipulate the hardware to make the code run faster... I think that's the biggest difference.

And I think in the real world... CEs build things like PDAs and processors... while CSs focus on the functionality of them and what programs run on them..

oh, and one more thing.... the main difference between the two, as told to me once... is about 15 grand a year... CE being the higher of the two... and as quoted above programmers are a dime a dozen and CE work is supposedly harder... but I'd take the hardware/design end over algorithms and freakin discrete math any day..